HC Deb 08 May 1934 vol 289 cc1056-64

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Captain Margesson.]

11.2 p.m.

Mr. MAXTON

I must apologise to the House for detaining it, but as I understand that the other House has only just risen we, the Commons, cannot seriously object to doing a quarter of an hour longer than our elders and betters in another place. The matter that I wish to raise was dealt with at Question Time to-day by the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland in what I regarded as an unsatisfactory way. Perhaps he was limited by the rules and regulations at Question Time. I certainly felt that I was limited by the rules and regulations at Question Time. This is not what one would regard as a matter of great national importance. Perhaps it is of no interest to anyone outside the small town in Scotland where the thing occurred and which happens to be the town in which I have lived for over 40 years. The persons concerned have been known to me for many years and one of them I hope and believe that I can claim as a friend.

The local authority, carrying out its duties under legislation passed by this House, set about a slum clearance scheme. They made the best calculations they could as to the needs of the town. They condemned as unsuitable for habitation a number of dwellings and proceeded to build the houses that they believed would be adequate to rehouse the people who were displaced. When they had completed their scheme and proceeded to the allocation of the houses it was found that they had made miscalculations and that there were 50 families whom they could not accommodate. They were left in the various buildings that were condemned. Two families were evicted from a particular property by the owner of that property under, as the Under-Secretary explained, an eviction order from the sheriff. Why that eviction was initiated I do not know. The houses were condemned and there were no other occupants wishing to go in. There was no possibility of drawing rent. Why that particular proprietor should evict them from that particular property I do not understand.

The local authority had no alternative accommodation to offer them. There was no alternative accommodation available in the town, where the men have lived and brought up their families. They went to occupy another of the condemned properties, which was not owned by a private proprietor but had been acquired by the town itself. One of the men had a family of eight. They were doing no harm to anyone. They were not offensive or objectionable tenants and yet, on some authority which I have not yet been able to discover and about which the Under-Secretary was unable to inform me at Question Time, these people, who were put out of their original homes by the operations of this Government—quite benevolent operations admittedly, the operation of re-housing slum dwellers—were visited at these (houses in the middle of the night. After the men, their wives, and families had retired for the night and were in bed, the police walked in, dragged the men out of their beds, took them down to the police station, and locked them up for the night. There was not the faintest danger of these men running away, there was no danger of them committing a crime, and one must regard this simply as a piece of jackboot Prussjanism, just sheer, petty officialdom trying to demonstrate power against inoffensive citizens.

Surely that is not the spirit that is actuating the great war on the slums that the Minister of Health commenced so bravely with a blare of trumpets—" We are going to carry on a war against the slums; we are going to abolish the slums." Here are two men and their wives and families doing a thing which an intelligent local authority would have arranged for them to do, and they are subjected to this kind of treatment. I am asking the Under-Secretary of State on whose authority these arrests were made, if this method of handling the housing of persons displaced from their homes has the approval of the Scottish Office and His Majesty's Government, and if he is ready to use his influence to see that these people, whom the local authority, although they dishoused them, have been unable to provide with alternative accommodation, have that accommodation provided for them and that no further police proceedings are taken against them.

11.7 p.m.

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. Skelton)

The hon. Gentleman has asked me several definite questions, to which I shall not be at all loath to reply. He asked me, as representing the Secretary of State for Scotland, whether we have any power of acting in the circumstances that he has described, and he has, so far as I know, accurately described the occurrences on a night late in April. Let me, first of all, deal with the authority under which those occurrences took place. The apprehension of the two men who had, without the consent of the owners, taken the occupancy of two houses, belonging to the Corporation of Barrhead, which had been closed previous to demolition, was under the authority given by the Trespass Act of 1865, and the relevant ruling Section is that when such an occupancy without the consent of an owner takes place, the police are enjoined to apprehend the persons found in that occupancy. My hon. Friend asks on whose authority it was done. The authority was the authority given to the police by that Section. If my hon. Friend, as I think he does, seeks to ask at whose instance the police acted, then I can reply to him that my information is that it was at the instance of a responsible official of the Barrhead Corporation, who were and are the owners of these two condemned houses. That is the simple fact. What subsequently happened is of importance. The two men who were apprehended and put into the police cells for the night were brought before the magistrate next morning in accordance with the Act and there pleaded guilty to the offence. They were then released without bail and the case was continued. My hon. Friend will therefore see that at this moment it is impossible for the Secretary of State or myself to interfere in the matter which is sub judice. With regard to the action of the police, neither the Secretary of State nor I have any locus or authority at all. It is entirely a matter arising under the Act to which I have referred. I need hardly say that as we have no authority to interfere that the action of the police in this matter cannot be regarded as throwing any light upon the policy of the Government with regard to slum clearance, which seemed to be the matter most exercising my hon. Friend.

I do not think, in the circumstances that I have stated, it is for me to say whether the action of the police, undertaken on that complaint, has or has not my approval because we have no authority in the matter, and, as we have no authority, we have, I think, no opportunity of expressing approval or disapproval. I may add, however, that I am very conscious of what my hon. Friend remarked in pointing out that it appeared that the housing authority, the Town Council, had no alternative houses to offer these men, but I would point out to the hon. Gentleman, as I am sure he knows, that it is not the function nor within the power of the Department of Health, which is concerned from the Governmental point of view with housing, to deal with the housing of particular persons. That is a matter for the local authority and it is therefore entirely without my purview when a question is pointed out to me of an individual person in a particular district who is unable to get a house. On such matters I can only draw the attention of the local authority.

I do not think—and this is the only point on which my information is not at one with the statement of the hon. Gentleman—that he is correct in stating that the local authority had completed its slum clearance programme, and found itself short of houses. My information is that the local authority has had 180 houses approved under the 1930 Act and of these only 102 have been completed, leaving 78 under completion.

Mr. MAXTON

They are not started.

Mr. SKELTON

I can give only the information at my disposal. It is a fact that in the 102 houses which were completed those two families were not selected as tenants, but the selection of tenants, so long as it is within the provisions of the Act, is a matter which is purely in the hands of the local authority, and I must therefore disclaim any responsibility for that matter. It is without my purview and out of my power to insist in any way on local authorities selecting particular people to occupy houses either slum clearance or other. Therefore, on the whole matter I reply that the action of the police was, so far as I know, in strict consonance with the provision of the Act.

Mr. MAXTON

But not with ordinary humane considerations.

Mr. SKELTON

That action was taken at the instance of an official of the local authority owning the houses. So far as the proceedings are concerned, the matter is at present sub judice, and in any event neither the Secretary of State nor I have any power of interference with the action that has been taken. Should the case be proceeded with there may then arise the question of sentence, which will introduce a different situation, and my hon. Friend knows that he is perfectly at liberty to ask the Secretary of State to consider the suitability of the sentence, and so forth. But that situation has not arisen, and in the circumstances I do not think there is any further explanation I can give to my hon. Friend.

11.16 p.m.

Mr. BUCHANAN

I trust the House will forgive me if I pass a few observations on the remarks of the Under-Secretary. First let me thank him for his courteous and painstaking reply. He has been at pains to get the facts and was very courteous in his statement. I am glad to see there is only one small point of variation between the two of us. The Under-Secretary stated that they had completed 102 houses and had 78 still to complete. Those who know the place know that nobody knows when the local authority are going to start on the 78. What is the good of approving the houses if they are not started I would sooner have 5,000 houses started than 5,000,000 approved and not started. It is true that there are 180 approved, but they have built only 102. In the meantime two decent men have been turned into criminals. Neither of these men has ever been in criminal trouble of any kind. I put this question seriously and not flippantly to the Under-Secretary, for whom I have a great regard. I was critical of him when he took his present job, but he has acquitted himself with great capacity and great humanity. Surely he is not going to tell the House of Commons the Scottish Office have to stand by and allow eight children and a woman to be without a home? The thing cannot be done. The local authority may do that; but, say what they like, the Scottish Office could act. For one thing they are the defenders of public order, and when certain things happen public order may be endangered, as the turning out of eight children would endanger public order.

I see men here, who are not of my political way of thinking, who if they saw eight children turned into the street would rebel. When public order is in danger the Scottish Office act with ruthlessness, and I say this is a public danger and a public menace. This is not the first time this has happened in Barrhead. The hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. D. Graham) will remember what happened in his Division. I remember that the lawyer who defended him came from his Division—Mr. Cassels I think he was. I understand that the police did not, on the first night, put them into prison, but they gave notice that they were going to make an arrest; they gave the people a chance to get out. I think the hon. Member for Hamilton will agree with me, because he knows the facts better than I do. In Barrhead, no notice was given. The persons were just arrested and taken down into Clydebank.

Mr. SKELTON

The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) is not correct in saying that the police did not give notice. I ought to have mentioned that several days previously the police were at the houses and warned the people that unless they left certain results would follow. So notice was given.

Mr. BUCHANAN

As far as I know, no official notice was given. All that happened was that there was a personal conversation with the police and the people did not take that as a notice. The official warning given in the Hamilton case was a sheriff's notice—as we say in Scotland, it was a proper blue notice. The theory of Scots law is, I think, that unless there is a chance that a man will not turn up next morning or that he is going to create public disorder, he is allowed to go home. In this case the man was not going to create any public disorder. He was simply going back to his bed, but he was detained for the night. Two families may be only two families, but they create a human problem, and the Under-Secretary of State should not allow the Barrhead Town Council to throw those people out, because he does himself less than credit and less than justice.

It is not without responsibility. It is true that he can argue in the abstract that he has no power, but in actual practice he has great power. He has power in connection with great matters of public policy over these local authorities. Instead of turning out the people, the Barrhead Town Council should bend their brains to building new houses and not building them at a slow rate. Imagine a town like Barrhead building only 100 houses. The Under-Secretary has great powers of pressure. Under-Secretary's have, in the main, been very capable, as Mr. Westwood was, and they have applied themselves well to their problems. I trust that the present Under-Secretary will see that the little town of Barrhead is not allowed to get into disfavour by an action of this kind.

11.25 p.m.

Mr. SKELTON

I would ask the leave of the House to say a word in reply. There is no question up to date of two families, with eight or any other number of children, being turned out; they are still occupying the houses, and the two men, who were released without bail, have gone back to them. I am familiar with the case at Hamilton to which the hon. Member referred, and I am well aware of the anxious situation which arises from the point of view of order and from every other point of view when people are turned out with nowhere to go, but that situation has not arisen here; the question with which we are dealing this evening is entirely that of the propriety of the action of the police, and there, as I have said, both in theory and in fact, the situation, both legal and administrative, is that neither my right hon. Friend nor I have any power of interference. The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) went into the wider question of the housing situation in Barrhead. That does not arise directly out of this Debate, but I may say that there, as in other places where there is a five-years programme for slum clearance, we are in consultation and communication with the town council. I did not, however, refer to that, because I did not think that that was the direct topic with which we were concerned.

Mr. MAXTON

Do I understand the hon. Gentleman to say he has absolutely no power to intervene in the matter unless some public disturbance can be arranged for?

Mr. SKELTON

I hope I have made it clear that this action that took place under the Trespass Act of 1865 of apprehension by the police is one in which I have no power to intervene. The Statute makes it clear that we have no power to deal with action of the police which proceeds from the complaint of the owner. The Statute is so framed that there is no power of intervention at all. That is the main question that has been asked me and that is the way I have to answer it.

11.27 p.m.

Mr. MCGOVERN

Do I understand that these families are to be allowed to remain in possession and are not to be turned out into the street, and, if there is a danger of their being turned into the street will the hon. Gentleman guarantee to intervene with the authorities to prevent that?

Mr. SKELTON

That is a question that I may well take up with the local authority but at present there is no sign of that situation arising.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-eight Minutes after Eleven o'Clock.